Another successful craigslist transaction

I don’t know why I celebrate using a garage sale website successfully, but I do.  If you knew anything about my bloodline, you would know that I come from some of the most hardcore garage salers ever.  My mother, father, and both sets of grandparents couldn’t dream of a better day than wasting 8 hours looking at other people’s shit.  My mother has refurnished her home 10 times over by things that other people would have let the garbage truck take away.   The highlight of my families garge sale illness has to be the 8 person jacuzzi they found at a garage sale for 50 bucks.  The kicker, it came with nothing.  No frame.  No pumps. No chemicals. Nothing  associated with maintaining a jucuzzi.  Now it sits in my mothers fenced in back yard growing weeds around it still six years later untouched since the day several people carried it in the back yard. 

I will not lie that I do love garage saling.  If my mother could only experience Chicago garage sales because people like to give away some pretty cool stuff.  My issue with going to garage sales is time.  Who has enough to drive around looking for them? I sure as hell don’t.  So a few years ago, I stumbled upon Craigslist.  Craigslist is by far the greatest garage sale site on the planet.  Not only can you get a free couch today, but also a furnace, blue chair, entertainment center, couch, camping toilet (they do not say whether it has been cleaned, but it’s sitting at the end of the road for some lucky winner), table, alarm clock, clothes, bed, futon, dressers, and all sorts of other stuff.  I swear, if I were to ever become homeless through craigslist I could completely furnish an empty home for free in a matter of two weeks. 

Anyone that has ever golfed with me know that my golf clubs suck.  They were a nice set of left handed clubs that I chose as a sales reward out of a catalog more than twelve years ago.  Unfortunately I lost the putter that went with that set in a freak “law of physics” incident where I learned that a rubber golf cart tire isn’t the right surface to angrily bang a putter against in a fit of rage. 

Lately this summer during a few of my golf outings, I have had golf club envy and beyond that actually am relatively embarrased by the clubs that I use.  Due to my lack of practice and playing time, my game will never get better, but I have to believe that technology has evolved so much in the past ten years or so that a new set of clubs would easily improve my game by a good 10 strokes.  I have a putter that has to be more than 30 years old.   The putter goes back to the first set of clubs I ever bought. 

When I was a freshman in high school, a girlfriends father asked me if I golfed.  “Of course!” I said.  “I go all the time!”  When asked if I own clubs, I followed up the lie with another saying that I did indeed own golf clubs. 

He asked me if I would play with him that upcoming Saturday to which I gladly accepted.  The problem was that I didn’t own any golf clubs.  I had never golfed.  I had very little money.  My mother was hard pressed to put food on the table each day with the assistance of the goverment’s food stamp program, so she didn’t exactly have hundreds of dollars lying around to give me so that I could back my lies. 

Finding a used set of golf clubs was harder than I imagined in the small town of Pekin.  First of all I had no money.  Secondly, I had no car.  Thirdly I am left handed which significantly decreased my chances of finding anything.  So I hopped on my bike to ride around town hitting all of the pawn shops.  Finally I stumbled upon an antiques shop that had a golf bag full of dozens of clubs.  When I realized that there were some left handed clubs in there, I pieced together six or seven clubs and told the owner my situation.  I had all of ten bucks on me.  Without a price marked on each club, the owner made me a deal and sold me every lefty piece for the ten bucks.  He even threw in a 1940’s era ripped golf bag in the deal.  So, I was all set. 

I practiced enough in the few days to look like I knew how to play even though I had no clue how the scoring worked so it had to have been pretty obvious that I lied to her father.  But it was fun none the less. 

Now that you have the back story on the putter I use and where it originated, lets fast forward to last Friday’s transaction. 

I want new clubs.  I can’t validate spending seven or eight hundred on a new set of clubs since I play maybe 5 times a year now if I am lucky.  So I have been watching Craigslist latey looking for a nice gently used set of clubs for a good price.  On Friday I stumbled upon someone selling a set of used clubs for fifteen bucks.  FIFTEEN BUCKS???  I looked at the picture, and the clubs didn’t look any older than what I played with and the Driver alone looked much better than what I have, so I emailed him and luckily I was the first to contact him, so chalk me up as the winner. 

After exchanging info with the seller, I decide to head out and drive the 20 miles to his place to pick them up immediately.  As I leave the office I am hit in the face with a cutting wind.  As I walk across the parking lot in the corner of my eye I see a green paper fly bye in the wind that resembled a dollar bill.  So like a kid I switch directions and eye the bill and began running.  As I chased this bill flying in the wind I began looking around to make sure that I wasn’t on the laughing end of a reality show called “watch the fat guy chase a dollar bill” and to my luck I didn’t see anyone watching me so the chase was on.  I am glad that it was because a good 150 yards later as the bill neared the edge of the lot, I caught up with it and managed to step on it.  As I slowly moved my foot off to inspect it, I am shocked to find that it is actually a twenty dollar bill. I inspect the bill before picking it up to make sure that there isn’t a string attached to pull it away or that I am not going to be a victim of the old “poo dollar” trick which I have joined in on many times during college.  If you don’t know what Poo dollar is, then I will have to post on that later, because it just brought back some funny college memories out of nowhere.  After realizing that the twenty dollar bill was clean, I pick it up and began heading back toward my car.  How odd that on the day that I am lucky enough to find a set of left handed clubs for sale for fifteen bucks that I would be even luckier to find a twenty flying bye? 

So I pull up an hour later to the sellers driveway where he is working in his garage.  We exchanged pleasantries and he pulled out the golf bag and full set of clubs.  The driver, 3 wood, and 5 wood are serious upgrades over my current set and the Putter could have been gold plated at this point, so I hand him the twenty I found earlier.  He was as excited for getting more than we agreed to as I was for getting free clubs.  You could call it a win win.  After I gave him the money, I asked how he came upon the clubs to which he said he found them at an auction and no one wanted them since they were lefty.  He picked them up for five bucks.  I didn’t ask if they guy had passed away because there is something weird about that since there is a slightly used golf glove in the bag that I am still on the fence as to whether I should use or not. 

Wow, I just went on for a really long time about Craigslist.  I could have just said Dennis and Craigslist sitting in a tree…

This took me back.  I will have to share the poo dollar story sometime.  Also thinking about the dead mans clubs (that sounds like a Pirates of the Caribbean movie:  Pirates of the Caribbean, Dead mans clubs”)  brought back the memory of how I got my first tuxedo for free.  I guess I don’t have to tell it now because I guess I gave it away already.

Filed under: Golf, craigs list, stupid, trailer, train wreck, weird

Word of the day

“Today’s word is legs…”  (this is one of my old favorite pickup lines)

“…so what do you say that we go back to my place and spread the word!”  (sound bad joke drum symbol here)

Actually boys and girls…todays word is Greed.  I know I shouldn’t let this have any sort of effect (affect?) (I never paid attention to how to use which during class) (today I am the king of parenthesis) on my mental being, but I can’t really help it. 

I want a Wii.  I do but I don’t.  I want one, but I am not willing to buy it from some jackass who knows exactly when the truck unloads at Walmart and has an insider that tells him when to come to pick them up.  This same jackass takes a product that is advertised at 280.00 and sells it on ebay/craigslist for 400.00 or more.  The saddest part of the Wii shortage, is that it isn’t so much a shortage as it is a problem with society today.  Greedy mofo’s.  What bothers me even more is that I could actually buy one right now from Walmart if I wanted to.  I couldn’t buy it for 280.00 bucks though…try 680 bucks.  Walmart has chosen to offer the Wii, and force you to buy options as well as 6 games. 

I am a good salesman.  I have finally sold my wife on the idea that life would be so much better if we owned one.  But I am smart enough to know that it would be a waste of my breath to to ask her if she would be down with me dropping over 700.00 on a gaming system.  Will I eventually drop that coin on the system?  Sure.  But I can’t validate spending more than 100.00 over retail for a basic system, or buying the system along with 6 additional games in one swing. 

I don’t even have time to play it.  This might just be my obsessive compulsive addictive personality rearing it’s ugly head, and I can’t get it out of my brain.  It’s like I have to have one now just to beat the system. 

The word of the day is also brought to you by the Chicago Cubs.  I have been in a “virtual” waiting room for over an hour now watching a little web browser count down from 15 seconds until the next refresh while I wait to be “randomly” chosen to buy Cubs tickets.  What pisses me off about this…on top of the whole Wii thing…is that I am a fan who just wants to watch a freaking ball game.  It makes me ill that I am going to be unable to get tickets at face value for my team because scalpers are in the know and are scooping up all of the tickets that they will turn around and resell for a ridiculous profit while I type this.  (wow, run on city!) 

Lastly, my wife and I are planning on going to see a country concert this summer at soldier field.  I am a Gary Allan (I know, who cares) fan and Jeanne likes some of the other people performing as well.  Something like 8-9 mega country stars.  Anyway, I bought tickets yesterday from ticketmaster.  They aren’t on sale to the general public yet, just fan club members.  Well, I’m not a fan club member but I was able to find the fan club member password for this event through a general google search and was able to buy decent tickets.  What amazes me is that you can go online right now and find the tickets that I have going for four time the cost of what I paid.  They are selling too!  Am I dumb for not buying up 8-10 tickets and then throwing them out there and having my overpriced bought Wii sponsored by my own greedy actions?  I don’t think I can do that.  I guess that’s the type of guy that I am. 

Sorry to Rant, but today I am surrounded by many greedy bitches and I am looking down the barrel of one long balloon twisted weekend.  I have four parties all together.  A School fair for two hours tonight, two-two hour parties back to back tomorrow, and another two hour birthday party on Sunday. 

Have a safe and happy weekend!

Filed under: Birthday, Wii, balloon, bitchy, craigs list, grouchy, stupid, weekend, weird

Moral dilemmas

Before I tell of my moral battles I would just like to ask the question: What is up with the word muscles?  It would appear that everyone online is searching for muscles.

And the movie “The Last Dragon.”

 

One of my all time favorites. 

On a movie note, I am celebrating today since I have recently discovered that my all time favorite actor will be going back to his “born to play” character.  It’s been a long time and we will soon be united.  The tag line is:  “He is back!”  It’s not Indiana Jones (although I am anticipating that one as well.)

You guessed it! 

Pee Wee! 

Paul Reubens is dusting off the old gray suit and feels that after 16 years the general public doesn’t remember that there was no shame in his game.   I will not lie.  If he has the balls to re-create Pee Wee Herman, then I would pay to see it.  I can’t count the number of times I have been scoffed at by my wife for forcing her to go to sleep to the sounds of Pee Wee’s Big Adventure or Big Top Pee Wee.  I am sad that I just admitted that. 

So, back to my moral issues. 

1.  One of my vendors offered a contest.  The more product you sell the more points you get.  Once the contest is over you can take those points and go to an online website and buy prizes.  I did pretty well and ended up with a lot of points.  Not enough points to get a new HDTV like I wanted, but enough to get a bunch of other fun stuff. 

 

So, one day I was on the site and I noticed that one of the very large HDTV’s was only 3000 points when I thought it usually was 65,000 points.   So, I click on it and realize that this HDTV is really only 3000 points.  I thought at first that they might be having a monster closeout on these TV’s and dropped the price.  It seemed too good to be true.  So, I added 3 to my cart, and checked out.  9000 points and I have 3 very large HD LCD televisions on their way to my house.  In all of my celebration, I called my wife and shared my good fortune.  Sadly, she was not only not as excited as I was, but upset that I was capitalizing on what she thinks was a mistake.  I assured her that it might be a legitimate offer.  She wasn’t having any of it.  She went on to ask me what I should have done instead of ordering.  I think the question was “What woult have been the right thing to do?”  She could have just said “check mate” when she asked that question.  I responded with “Order more than 3?”  Wrong.  I went on to back my argument with a similar story in college that in the end didn’t back my answer but actually hers.  

My Soph year of college at ISU I went into the nearest gas station to pick up 2 30 packs of Bud Lite cans and some smokes.  When the guy rang up the total, the price was astronomically low.  The thirty pack should have been 12.00 but each was ringing up for 3.00 per 30 pack.  I asked him if he was sure that was correct, and he answered with a “wow, man…we must be having a sale!”  I think he was as baked as anyone I had ever seen.  So, being the bargain hunter I was, I said cool, let me get another 2 30 packs.  After carrying 4 30 packs the block and a half back to my fraternity house, I proceeded to tell others.  Before I knew it 4 guys were out the door going to the store with a truck.  They returned with the remaining 30 packs.   20 total.  I asked the guys if the guy behind the register had any clue that the price was wrong in the register. All they said was that the register guy was so excited because he had a beer sale that was over 70.00.  The next day I went back to the gas station to see if they had restocked and I asked an older gentelman who was behind the counter if they had gotten any more Bud Lite can 30 packs in.  He replied with a “you must be one of the smartasses that cleaned us out yesterday.”  I asked if the price was truly a mistake and he went on to say that the attendant that was too stupid to realize the mistake had been let go.  I guess I didn’t feel an ounce of pity at the time for the fool that was too stupid to realize.

After Jeanne repeated the question again, “What would have been the right thing to do?”  I  answered as she requested that “I should have called the company and asked if it was truly a deal or if someone made an error.”  “That way they could have fixed it immediately instead of having a bunch of idiots like me getting Flat Screen HDTV’s virtually for free.”  She is right.  I am an idiot.  I still debate with myself as to whether I made a poor moral decision.  If they have it on the site for the points listed, and I place the order, am I in the wrong?  What’s the difference between that and someone bargain hunting and getting a steal?  The morning after Thanksgiving people will go into stores at 4:00 am all over the country to be the first at the deal busters.  How is this different than that?    

So, I still haven’t received the televisions.  I did receive an email from the comany fulfilling the orders stating that for some reason there was a monsterous backlog on those LCD’s (One again, I have no idea why) and in order to fulfill them within the next 3 months they will be substituting that model with a different model.  Fine by me.  No complaints here.  I will post more if and when the 3 LCD TV’s come.  I also ordered his and hers matching moutain bikes, an Oasis Party table and chair set, a shower clock radio, and a pretty nice iPod 7″ video player/DVD player/docking station.  I haven’t received any of it yet. The bikes are exciting because that is what I got my wife for her birthday a year a half ago, and I am finally delivering on the present.  Hey, better late than never, I say! 

To combat my immoralness, my wife thinks that I should go to church more.  So, this past Sunday, when I tried to sleep in, I was forced to mass by my wife.  No argument here.  I guess this is one of the reasons that I fell in love with my wife from the get go. 

I have two other moral dilemmas but has gone on way too long.  One involving work and another church.  I will fill you in later on those. 

Filed under: Car, Church, achy, beer, body, confused, craigs list, excuse, fight, grouchy, mean, moving, muscles, pain, romance, scared, sore, stupid, train wreck, weird, wife, work

People on Craigslist do not know how to measure a television.

 

George Bush does not like Black people. 

That is what I felt like I said as I typed the title of this mornings dose of bloggery. 

I am sick.  I started feeling sick on Saturday morning and it had grown into a full blown chest and head cold on Saturday evening.  I tried to look back to place blame on any sick individuals I have been around and none came to mind.  It then dawned on me that this is my typical beginning of the school year sickness that my wife drags home each and every start to the school year.  It dawned on me this time that every end of August/beginning of Sept I am sick.  How on earth I have not caught onto this is beyond me since this is the 7th start to the school year that has yielded nothing but misery for me.  I  have actually gone into my electronic calendar for August 16th of 2008 and created a reminder so that I do not forget to overload on vitamins and stop kissing Jeanne. 

She did a good job of taking care of me this weekend.  When I get sick I as much of a little baby as it gets sans crying. 

Yesterday was heaven for a sicko.  My ideal sick day is sitting in front of the TV and watching movies and playing video games.  I felt bad playing video games while Jeanne worked so hard around the house, but how much effort does pushing buttons take while laying on your back covered with 8 blankets? 

Speaking of televisions, let me hit my title.  On Friday I bought my second used television off of craigslist.  Here’s how it went down.  On Tuesday of last week, someone posted a “36 inch” used television at a very good price.  I did not see it until Thursday and emailed that morning asking if it was still available.  I received an email Thursday afternoon saying that I could have it if I promised to drive down to Chicago and pick it up on Thursday during the day.  So, I agreed.  Along with my agreement, I specifically asked her if it was truly a 36 inch television since I was duped last time by a crying big boobed lady into buying a 27 inch television that was advertised as a 36 inch. 

This was my query:

I do want to make sure that you have measured it to be 36”.  Last month I drove down to the city to pick up a 36” and it turned out to be a 27” television and the person selling just thought it looked 36”. 

This was her response:

Yes it is a true 36″ TV  

When I arrived, I was able to see that it was substantially larger than the last TV that I drove down to pick up.  The guy who met me had already unplugged the TV and moved it to the front door.  They were moving that afternoon and needed it out by a certain time.  The guy didn’t give me a chance to plug it in and see if it actually worked, so I was lowered to simply asking him if it worked and taking his word.  I did.  He told me he would help me carry the TV and in my stupidity I decided to try and lift it myself and was able to do so.  a busted pinky and several scratches to the TV later, it was in the back of my car. 

That was one heavy ass TV.  I would guess that it rang in at 150lbs.  The guy kept going on and on about how it took two guys to get it into his place.  The house they lived in was in squalor and after I left I decided that if the TV didn’t work that they needed the money more than I, therefore I wouldn’t be bothered at all.  I had a hunch it worked since as I was closing the car door the guy said “say bye bye to the tv” to his 3 year old and the little boy said “bye TV”.   It made me a little sad since it had become very obvious to me that they were not selling because of not having the room, but because they truly needed the money.  Which made me feel even worst as I drove around the block and disposed of the TV stand that they give me with the TV.  The TV stand looked as if it hadn’t been cleaned in years and had many disturbing stains and marks.  I threw it in someones dumpster. 

As I drove home with my newly acquired used TV I contemplated how on earth I was going to be able to lift this beast up the five feet in the air to place it in the cubby hole that was built in the wall above my fireplace.  After doing my best olympic lifter impression and almost having 150lbs come crashing on top of me, I was able to get it in it’s rightful spot and to my surpise, it worked.  For 2 days I was unable to pull on anything with strength with either hand.  My pinky is still in the process of healing.  

After setting everything up, I went downstairs and grabbed the tape because I thought 36 inches would be a little tighter in the cubby hole and to my horror I discovered that it was only 32 inches.   ARE YOU KIDDING ME????? I officially give up on my quest to buy a used 36 inch television.  I now am the owner of 5 televisions that all work.  I have also realized that if the 32 inch television barely fit into my car, then 36 will not.  So, I am going to take this as a sign that I am not supposed to own another 36″ television.   

For the record:  When measuring a television, you take a measuring tape and measure from the top left of the screen to the bottom right diagonally across the screen.  Or the bottom left to the top right.  Either way works.  It is fromt he corner of the screen to the other corner of the screen.   Not from the corner of the casing to the other corner of the casing.   Fool me once, shame on you…fool me twice, shame on me. 

Filed under: Car, achy, body, confused, craigs list, moving, muscles, pain, sore, train wreck, weird, wife

Decisions decisions

 

I am attempting my second purchase off of craigslist today.  Another 36″ television.  Hopefully this one will actually be 36 inches and I will not have to listen to a top heavy sobbing woman cry about how her fiance just called off their wedding. 

If this is truly 36″ I am hoping as well that the husband can help me carry the television. 

I am also hoping that it fits into my car.  I am also hoping that when they sent me instructions on where to that the description “around the back” doesn’t mean that gang bangers will be waiting to take all my money or more.  When they emailed me and said that they were towards the back of the building, I started to worry about the tranaction.  I am going to have to do 2 serious drive bys and if anything looks fishy, even if it looks like a shady neighborhood, I’m gonna roll out.  There’s nothing like the feeling that I should be bringing heat to a television transaction. 

This will complete my television quest.  I have upgraded in size upstairs in our living room, as well as added two additional televisions to my basement.  If I ever have a Sunday this NFL season to actually stay home and watch, then I have the configurations to set up 4 TV’s and watch 4 different NFL games.  I have never gone without the standard 2 TV’s at once while flipping between 4 different games, but 4 TV’s is a start towards my ultimate goal of between 6 and 8 televisions in the basement for the “sports bar” effect. 

My wife thinks I am nuts.

This morning while I was listening to the radio during my hour long 14 mile commute, Mike and Mike on ESPN brought up an interesting Fantasy Football quandry that a fellow resident of the Chicagoland area is in.  A 32 year old woman has met the man of her dreams.  Recently they had scheduled for both of their sets of parents to come into town (from where I don’t know) to meet each other.  The woman and her boyfriend are big cub fans but it turns out that the woman is a major football fan and the boyfriend could care less about football (gay).  So, this woman is in a fantasy football league and her league scheduled their draft for this Saturday night.  The same Saturday night that both sets of parents will be meeting each other and a dinner is planned. 

What would you do?  This isn’t a scenario. This is a real life situation. 

I personally would have called the weekend off the moment that I realized there was a conflict.  Call the parents and tell them to find a different weekend that works.  But they are past that.  Now she must miss the dinner and go to the draft or miss the draft and go to the dinner.  I think she has to go to the dinner.  Find someone who she can give a list to who will draft according to her rankings.  Although, I personally feel like playing fantasy football without drafting the team yourself is like sleeping through Christmas morning and waking to find that someone has unwrapped all the presents and did a big white elephant exchange so that you ended up with gifts that you really didn’t want, much less have the pleasure to open. 

Big 3 day weekend ahead of us.  Boy, I need it. 

Filed under: confused, craigs list, fantasy, moving, muscles, pain, sore, stupid, train wreck, weird, wife

smodgepodgehodgepodge

 

Today’s post will be brought to you by Sobe No Fear.

SoBe No Fear, 16oz’s of super charged energy with advanced components and a great berry-passion fruit flavor. Brought to you by the creators of SoBe Healthy Refreshments and the performance masterminds of No Fear.

Drink lots of it and you will have random stupid thoughts race through your mind all day and you will start to get angry for no reason with a fast heart rate and get angry for no reason about stupid stuff.  I call it Roid Rage Juice for a reason!  

Many things on my mind this morning.  Let me hit each one in an abbreviated form.

1.   check out this story.  http://www.cbs46.com/news/13889770/detail.html  Tell me this guy isn’t happily married and looking for any and all reasons out of his marriage. 

2.  For the past 5 days my father in law’s home phone stopped working and with the concern of his age (83) and health we decided that we would leave my cellphone with him until his phone came back on.  I have to admit, I didn’t really miss life without the cellphone.  I only hit maybe 4 or 5 instances where I needed it and those were purely based on needing the phone numbers that were stored in the phone.  I now understand that the 80.00 a month I spend on my cell bill is nothing more than a freaking expensive phone book. 

3.  I hate stupid people.  I am an admitted Craigslist addict and everyday the site reveals new beauty to me that I was not aware of.  Every day you never know what might happen.  Yesterday I posted an items wanted post for Jarts.  This morning I came in to work with responses from craigslisters such as this one from a very stupid individual:

Hi thereI saw your ad “Vintage Lawn Darts / Jarts wanted!” on craigslist. You know you could probably get it on eBay. Check it out here is the link: http://www.cajnica.com/bargainhunter/eBay_tutorial.html Hope this helps Igor JanWell, the beauty in this response is that the link leads you to a page full of spelling and grammatical errors and also the fact that I hate ebay which most craiglisters do as well.  I don’t know if this guys was trying to help or draw traffic to his stie.  He probably cuts and pastes that email to anyone looking for anything on craigslist.  I also got responses from people who have sets but wanted to apparently flaunt it since they were not willing to sell them to me.  All I can say is that if  you spend your time looking for items wanted posts and actually email the person to say “I have a set, good luck with your search!” or “I have a set but I am missing one with a red flight, if you come across just a red flight then let me know.” then you have waaaaay to much time on your hands.  I am learning that the outspoken portion of craigslist might just be a bunch of nutballs. 

4.  Last night I narrowly missed my largest temper tantrum to date with my wife.  Had she not gone through a very rocky 48 hours prior I might have let my anger loose which would have been very ugly.  After working and driving a total of 14 hours yesterday I finally arrived home last night at 9:30.  I hadn’t eaten all day and after my shower wanted to make something light to eat before bed.  My wife was stuck at home all day without a car since it was in the shop for repair.  She is in the middle of a major project that is taking up our entire living room.  I assumed that since she was home all day that the house would be clean, but she had other plans for her day.  Needless to say after 30 minutes of doing chores after a long day I was furiously angry.  Once again a sign that I should step away from the juice. (and another sign that scares me in regards to being mentally prepared for children)

I have other thoughts rattling around in my brain right now and really wanted to focus this post more on the stupidity of people than what I may have achieved. I guess I could have just said “People are stupid!” and ended the post there without creating my contentions and it would have been just as effective. 

I will type tomorrow about my good luck that I found out yesterday and share the news with everyone tomorrow.  I may even be able to surprise some of you with some good fortune of your own.  Enjoy your day. 

I get to watch Hootie and the Blowfish tonight at Ravinia (yawn) Good tickets.(10 years ago!)  My wife tried pumping me up about it this morning by saying that they are “back in mainstream.”  I had to stifle my laughter until she was far enough to not hear my chuckles.  I am only going purely for the time spent with the wife and the fact that you can BYOB at Ravinia and I loaded up a cooler that any man would be proud of.  I looked it over this morning and had a hard time convincing myself that I am going to a Cootie…I mean Hootie concert and not a Bears tailgate party.  I also brought my shower radio.  Would it be wrong to crank up 720 and listen to Pat and Ron for the Cubs game tonight vs. listening to Hootie?  I think not. 

Filed under: In laws, Roid Rage juice, beer, confused, craigs list, excuse, grouchy, mean, pain, scared, train wreck, weird, wife, work

Still swollen and impaled

 

Following up on yesterday’s post, the swelling has come down just a bit.  I assumed the role of “supportive husband” last night and offered words of strength and encouragement for what is going to be a year full of complaints about work from the wife. 

Today is a new day full of fresh new legs ready to deliver a new blow to the marble bag. 

 For some reason today I am obsessed with Lawn Darts or Jarts as we used to call them.  I want a set.  For those of you who were born in the late 80’s or early 90’s you really have no idea what I am talking about.  When I was a child you could buy a set of metal darts and two white plastic rings.

You would go out into the yard and with 2 or 4 players you would set the rings up 50 ft away from each other. The rules were simple, you would play until you had 20 points or you were impaled.  Much like the bean bag game you would throw the darts 20-30 feet in the air and try to have the dart stick in the plastic ring.  The only problem was that they found out that when you throw this dart into the air, it dives to the earth with what I have learned to be over 20,000 lbs/sq inch which caused many children to become impaled in the head or other body parts.  I remember as a child throwing them intentionally at my brother and him doing the same to me.  It was a good thing I was fast little mofo.  Anyway, apparently a child died after being brainstabbed by one of these darts and a lawsuit ensued.  (It’s all fun and games until someone gets brainstabbed!)  Once an investigation surfaced, they found out that something like 6 children had died from this game and over 6000 injuries had taken place due to this crazy ass game.  Not only did they stop the sale of this wonderful game, but the government actually made it illegal to sell.  Wow. 

I don’t know what it was about that game, but I always enjoyed it.  There was an art to it.  Much like the popular bean bag toss game now, but with pointy metal darts that can kill you.  Bean bag toss with a scary element. 

So, my search is officially on!  If any of you/your parents/your grandparents have a set they would like to sell, let me know.  I have already wasted some time on craigslist searching and posting for items wanted.  It would appear that they are being sold for around 50 bucks a set online around the country and I wouldn’t have a problem dropping 100.00 for a couple of good condition sets. 

I will update as I get word of a set that I might get my hands on. 

Filed under: body, craigs list, pain, weird

Alice the Goon

 

I can’t hold it in any longer, I have to post about it.  I see the same exact woman jogging in our neighborhood every single morning.  This woman spawns many thoughts as I drive past her.  I need to lose weight.  I fight several addictions in life with two of them being my love for food as well as my uncontrollable need to suck down an incredibly large sugar packed energy drink ever single morning.  And I smoke on occasion when I drink.  These 3 things make my quest to lose weight almost a virual imposibility.  Anyway, each and every day I see this same woman jogging.  Many emotions come from this daily occurence.  The first one is that she is always jogging south as I am driving south, so I blow by having to wrench my to get a look at the face.  My first emotion is usually awe since she doesn’t just jog alone.  She jogs with a stroller.  Not a normal stroller, but a double wide stroller for two children.  Twins maybe?   I don’t see children, only the lady.  She is ripped.  As you drive up from behind her, she is so incredibly in shape, it almost makes me feel bad to sip on my energy drink.  The typical man driving up behind her would have naughty thoughts because from behind, she is about as in shape as it gets.  As you drive past her, you turn your head and see your worst fear.  She is just downright ugly.  She has the face of an 80 year old polish lady that you would see in one of those old time depression films where the grandmother has the scarf over her head and looks like she is just off the boat from russia.  When I see her face I think back to my childhood watching Popeye cartoons.  There was this creature called “Alice the Goon” and that is exactly what she looks like in the face.  If I were to ever become the casting director for the next box office remake of Popeye, I would know exactly who to call. 

So, now every morning as I drive to work, I see Alice jogging.  I don’t get fooled like many probably do when they see an incredibly in shape woman jogging from behind.   I would imagine that being in very good shape allows her significant other to validate why he copes with such an unusual face.  I am sure she is a nice girl. 

Wow, way to start off this week.  I feel like I should go to confession for the last few paragraphs.  The weekend was ridiculous.  Friday night Jeanne and I decided to turn our visit to the Lake County Fair into an annuall occurence.  Since we went last year, we knew the routine.  The evening was highlighted with me getting into an argument with a semi toothless lady in one of those food trailers.  Jeanne bought a piece of stuffed pizza and to her dismay 3 tiny bites into it she met purely uncooked dough.  I took the piece and in anger went back to the booth to complain.  6 bucks for a piece of pizza and this carni was trying to tell me that the uncooked dough was melted ricotta cheese.  I scooped out the “Ricotta cheese” and tasted nothing but uncooked dough and finally demanded that she take a taste for her self and prove me wrong.  If she would taste what I just tasted and then would try and tell me that it was melted ricotta cheese, then I would take her word for it.  She wouldn’t and she opened the drawer before the challenge could even finish leaving my mouth and gave Jeanne her 6 bucks back. 

I managed to get a stomach ached from carnival food in record time.  I had a large slice of pizza, Winsconsin Cheddar fried cheese with marinara and Jalapeno ranch, a foot long corn dog, Pepsi, and topped it all off with a rootbeer float.  I felt like I had taken a fryer basket and licked it clean. 

My favorite part of the fair are the animals.  I love the animals.  Each and every year, you never know what you will see when you enter into the stables.  Jeanne had a chicken kick poop at her.  You would think that after seeing pigs my whole life that the unnatural sight of the monsterously large testicles on the pigs would get old.  It doesn’t.  As I get older, I have learned to appreciate the balls on these animals more and more.  I couldn’t imagine having to haul around those things.  They have to weigh like 20lbs each. 

Why did a google image search for “male pig” bring back many images of Tim Allen?  Weird.

After our fair share of weirdos at the fair we called it a night and I went home to twist balloons until 5:00am since I had t cancel a balloon event on Saturday due to our Church softball team making it into the final four tourney on Saturday.  I delivered a crap load of premade Jungle animal balloon hats to make amens for cancelling the day before the party.  They were happy, but I didn’t get much sleep prior to the game on Saturday.  I did manage to get drunk immediately following the game.  It has been a long time since I sat out in the sun on a beautiful day in lawn chairs drinking heavily.  It was a refreshing change of pace that pretty much ruined the rest of my Saturday since I passed out when I got home until 9:00 Saturday night.  Then I twisted some more since I had to make a disney princess castle for a birthday party on Sunday.  Good times with balloons this weekend. 

The inlaws came over on Sunday and started off fantastical when Jeanne’s father had a tumble on our concrete steps outside our place.  We thought that the visit had ended before it even begun, but after doing some bend tests we discovered some bumps and scrapes, but no other damage.  They came over for a cook out and I managed to seriously have my worst grilling outing ever.  My gas grill sucks and it is very difficult to cook on.  I had bonless ribs, chicken, and brats going at the same time while trying to finish the prep work for everything else inside at the same time.  The worst part was that I had to leave 15 minutes into everyone sitting down together to eat to drive down to US Cellular field to twist at a birthday party for a few hours.  I was sad to go, but that’s the life of a balloon twister. 

I have a funny craigslist story to tell, but that will come tomorrow since I have gone way over my budgeted time for today. 

Filed under: In laws, Roid Rage juice, balloon, beer, craigs list, grouchy, mean, scared, sleepy, train wreck, weird, wife

Fool me once…

 

Yesterday I completed my first Craigslist transaction.  I mentioned concern in yesterday’s post about the transaction.  I will say this:  If every transaction comes with dealing with a very pretty girl, I’m sold.  I would guess that she looked like she might have been an adult entertainer?  I don’t know, but the whole transaction was very weird and unsatisfying.  So, this is what happened:

On Tuesday I see a Post.  Here is the headline:

36 inch Sanyo TV, perfect condition – $100

I email her within 3 minutes of the post hitting the web.  We agree for me to pick up yesterday at noon.  I drive to Wrigleyville to pick it up and have concerns because the 36″ Sony television I have at home weighs over 200 lbs, and if this TV even weighs half of that, I am in trouble.  The woman answers the door and she is wearing a low cut V neck T-shirt that is probably 2 sizes too tight and workout pants.  I am overwhelmed to stifle my laughter at the obnoxiously large obviously fake boobs staring at me on a girl that can’t weight more than 90 lbs.  As I walked into her place, there are boxes everywhere packed up and she is still working on moving out.  So, I say “ya moving?” and she says “I guess.”  I asked where she is moving to, when she replies, “I was supposed to move to Puerto Rico on Monday and we were supposed to get married this weekend, but he called it off.”  pause…pause…then she started to cry.  I was now in a awkward postion standing there saying, “I’m sorry.” She went on to say that He just called it off and she was all packed up but had no where to move since her lease was up and someone else was moving into her place on the 1st of Aug.  I felt bad because this place was only half a block from Wrigley Field.  You couldn’t get any closer to the friendly confines.  She composed herself, and led me to the bedroom where the television was.  She powered it on and by now I didn’t care whether the TV worked, I just wanted to get the hell out of there.  I quickly moved the TV to see if it was liftable and it was.  I picked it up and navigated the TV through the hallways carefully.  I almost got to the door before I stopped and realized that I hadn’t given her any money yet.  I threw a 100.00 bill at her (I think that might be a common occurence for this lady) and got out quickly.  I was surprised that a 36″ Television fit into my car so easily. 

As I drove back to my office it dawned on me that I didn’t inspect or measure anything.  When I got to my office I wanted to take a look and see if everything was cool, but it was crammed in my backseat upside down, so there was nothing I could do.  After my softball game last night, I carried the television into the living room and put it where the old TV was.  It was at that moment that I realized that there was no way in hell this thing was 36″ based on the size of the cubby hole it went into.  I grabbed my measuring tape and ran it diagonally across the television and to my surprise it was only 27″.  TWENTY SEVEN INCHES????  I instantly became very mad because I could have bought many 27″ televisions for 50 bucks but was holding out for a 36.  I felt robbed.  Scammed.  But then it dawned on me that if I couldn’t tell the difference between a 27″ television and 36″ then I deserved what I got.  I think even if I would have realized at the time that it wasn’t 36″ I would have maybe offered her 70 bucks for it vs. the 100, but who knows.  I learned a pretty heavy duty lesson yesterday.  When buying televisions from Craigslist, be sure to bring a measuring tape and watch out for hot, big boobed, crying strippers.  

My wife got a big kick out of the whole process.  She felt sorry for the girl, but went on to joke about a girl that thinks a 27″ television is 36″.  I said that girls really don’t know much when it comes to electronics and this girl probably really thought she had a 36″ TV.  I wonder how this would equate if she were to ever be asked about the size of a man’s weiner.  If she is consistently juding things to be 9 inches larger than it really is, I bet she can really make a man feel good about him self.  A real ego booster. 

So, I am off again to try and find my 36″ television.  I will put this TV downstairs and use it for Football Sunday.  I am going to attempt to have 3 different TV’s going this year on Sunday in my basement.  Tonight I have softball and playoffs for my pool league.  I am hoping the softball game gets rained out so I can focus on one thing.    

Filed under: confused, craigs list, excuse, grouchy, moving, muscles, pain, sore, train wreck, weird, wife

ahhhhcraigslist

So, a week ago, I posted about my attempt to convince the wife that our house would come crashing through the upper Earth crust like the house in the final scene of Poltergeist if we did not buy a 36″ LCD television.  It worked. I slowly worked my magic.  At first she agreed to let us spend 400.00 on a TV.  I did some shopping and found a nice HD CRT for 500.00 and sold her on it.  Then I did some research and found out that the reviews were horrible, but I had moved her up to 500.00.  Next I found some higher rated options but the price was closer to 600.00.  She agreed after looking at it, but there was some concern about logistics and where we would purchase from.  Finally I talked her into the Holy Grail when I found a deal on a normal HD TV that was on sale for 800.00 down from 1000.00 and I would even get a 100.00 mail in rebate back.  This was it!  I was very excited.  700 bucks and I would have a 36″ HD LCD TV.  Unfortunately I did all of this selling prior to paying the bills this month.  By the time we looked at budgets I made the executive decision to wait until we are in a better place.  We are doing O.k. but with some of her schooling bills I don’t think it is the right time.  I am proud of this decision, because usually I am the first to throw out concern.  Maybe a sign that I am becoming a mature responsible adult?  Naaaa.  So, today I am actually driving to the city to buy a used TV I found on Craigslist.  I have been a craigslist stalker the last 3 days since I decided to buy a used television.  The real reason we are buying a TV is because the TV in our living room doesn’t work very well anymore.  Whites make the screen blurry.  It has been this way since before I went to college and one weekend I went home and found that my mother had thrown this TV on the curb because of the blurriness.  I decided to try my hand at electronics repair and was delighted to find out that the blurriness went away when you lowered the contrast and brightness.  So, the TV has been a bedroom fixture for me for the past 10 years.  When we moved into the new house, we decided it was too big (32″) to go into our bedroom so we placed it in the living room.  I bought a new 20″ flat screen for the bedroom so we are set there, but the problem is that our living room is too bright for the lower contrast and brightness.  So, I find myself watching blurry television.  It pisses me off.  I was fortunate to find a used 36″ CRT television that is in great shape on craigslist for 100.00.  I emailed the lady selling it 3 minutes after she posted it and I assume that she thinks that I am a television craigslist stalker. 

I go to pick up the TV today and I am a bit scared.  I love Craigslist but I am very frightened by it.  The big thing is “Cash Only”.  So, I am driving to the city with 100.00 in cash and walking up to a strangers house.  I have visions of the scene in scarface where Tony Montana goes to pick up drugs with cash and his buddy gets the chainsaw to the head.  I feel as if I am preparing for a drug deal.  I have decided that I will go with only 100 in cash and and empty wallet in the event of any funny stuff.  I did some research online of people that use craigslist to lure people with cash to a home that isn’t even theirs.  When the unsuspecting buyer shows up, they come out with guns pointed and demand the cash.  Obviously they clean you out and hit the road.  I know this is a very rare occurence or Craigslist would not be so popular, but I am still a bit worried. 

For the record, I am driving to a house at the intersection of Addison and Freemont street if I disappear.  Just thought I would post it here since I always hear about teens that post things before their disappearance on their Myspace page.  I am doing this relatively for humor, but a teeny tiny part of me feels that it is the right call, since I can’t tell the wifey about my concerns.  If I would, she would shoot my buy down in a heartbeat. 

So, my other concern is how the hell I am going to lift a 36″ television on my own.  I have done some minor research and it would appear that this TV should weigh anywhere between 150-180 lbs.  I watched the movers that hauled all my stuff last july and learned a trick for large objects that I will be testing today.  I am going to wrap with a blanket, and put several different rows of duct tape around the blanked and tv.  I will essentially create handles out of the tape that will allow me to deadlift the TV and walk with it only 6 inches off the ground.  I have a softball game this evening and one tomorrow night so this could seriously backfire on me.  I am still seriously sore from my softball game on Monday night as well, so this should be very interesting.  I will fill you in on how it all works out either later today or tomorrow.   My final concern is that my car is a tiny chevy prism.  Will this thing even fit in my front/back seat or trunk?  Who knows? 

I also have a funny story about the wife to tell about a night out she had last night with a bunch of girls but have no time.  I will post that tomorrow as well. 

Filed under: Car, achy, body, confused, craigs list, moving, muscles, pain, scared, sore, train wreck, weird, wife, work